Worse, the appeals court affirmed the convictions despite a significant Section 230 defense. The opinion contorted Section 230 law, relying on outmoded legal theories from Roommates.com. Fortunately, I haven't seen many citations to the appellate court's misinterpretation of Section 230, so the doctrinal damage to Section 230 hasn't spread too much (yet). However, that still leaves open whether Bollaert's conviction was correct.

Bollaert raised that issue by filing a habeus corpus petition in federal court. Such petitions are commonly filed and almost never granted, so Bollaert's petition had minimal odds of success as a matter of math. Not surprisingly, his petition fails.

The district court says that Section 230's application to Bollaert's circumstance does not meet the rigorous standard of "clearly established federal law":

In this case, the Supreme Court has never recognized that the CDA applies in state criminal actions. The Supreme Court has never indicated circumstances that would qualify a state criminal defendant for CDA immunity. Absence of applicable Supreme Court precedent defeats the contention that Petitioner is entitled to CDA immunity under clearly established federal law...

federal circuits have not applied CDA immunity in state criminal actions or indicated circumstances that would qualify a state criminal defendant for CDA immunity. Petitioner cannot satisfy § 2254(d)(1) with district court opinions applying CDA immunity in state criminal actions.

I've routinely blogged about the application of Section 230 to state criminal prosecutions, and I even wrote a lengthy discourse on why that was a good thing. Still, I can't think of any federal appellate courts that have reached this conclusion, so perhaps the court's factual claim about the jurisprudential absence is correct.

The court adds that even if Section 230 qualified as "clearly established federal law," the appellate court ruling didn't necessarily contravene that law:

the California Court of Appeal performed an exhaustive and comprehensive analysis of the applicable circuit court decisions before concluding Petitioner is an information content provider under Roommates. The state court reasonably interpreted Roommates and Jones, and reasonably concluded that Petitioner "developed, at least in part, the offensive content on his Web site by requiring users to input private and personal information as a condition of posting the victims' pictures, making him an information content provider within the meaning of the CDA."

This passage reinforces the deficiencies of the appellate court's Section 230 discussion. "[R]equiring users to input private and personal information as a condition of posting the victims' pictures" is not the encouragement of illegal content, as referenced by Roommates.com, as that information isn't actually illegal; and the Jones case rejected an "encouragement" exclusion to Section 230 while ruling for the defense. Do those deficiencies support the extraordinary relief of habeus corpus? Apparently not.

from the not-how-it-works dept

Revenge porn -- or, more accurately, "non-consensual pornography" -- is unquestionably bad. We've spent plenty of time mocking the jackasses who have been involved in these awful sites, and have been happy to see them flail around as the stench of their association with these sites sticks.

However, we have not supported the attempts by a small group of legal academics to criminalize running such a site for a variety of reasons. First, such an action would make plenty of protected speech illegal causing massive collateral damage to speech and internet platforms. Second, as we've repeatedly documented, these revenge porn sites don't seem to last very long, and those involved with them have a fairly permanent stain on their reputations. Third, in many cases, the type of people running these sites often seem to have already violated other laws, for which law enforcement is able to go after them.

In recent years, the Supreme Court has made it pretty clear that it has little interest in expanding the categories of speech that are exempted from the First Amendment. I've often pointed to lawyer Mark Bennett's 2014 blog post entitled First Amendment 101 in which he details out the very short list of speech that is not protected by the First Amendment. That post is actually about attempts to outlaw revenge porn and claims that it's not protected by the First Amendment, but the list is a useful one to point to any time anyone suggests that this or that speech shouldn't be subject to the First Amendment.

Some people insist that revenge porn would clearly be exempt from the First Amendment because it's so bad. But they ignore that, in recent years, the Supreme Court has made it clear that such awful content as video depictions of cruelty to animals and picketing military funerals with truly hateful signs is protected under the First Amendment. The Supreme Court has it's very short and narrow list of exceptions, and hasn't shown any indication that it's ready to expand that list.

Indeed, the very same Mark Bennett, earlier this year, helped get a Texas revenge porn law declared unconstitutional, as the court there recognized that the law ran afoul of the First Amendment, in that it was criminalizing a new category of speech not currently exempted, and was unable to survive strict scrutiny, as per the Supreme Court, for any legislation that includes content-based restrictions.

But Mark Bennett is now reasonably perturbed that the Supreme Court of Vermont has decided that that state's revenge porn law is constitutional. And part of the reason he's so perturbed is that the ruling is truly bizarre. It accurately notes that revenge porn does not fall into one of the delineated exceptions to the First Amendment... but (surprisingly) that it still can withstand strict scrutiny:

For the reasons set forth below, we conclude that “revenge porn” does not fall within an established categorical exception to full First Amendment protection, and we decline to predict that the U.S. Supreme Court would recognize a new category. However, we conclude that the Vermont statute survives strict scrutiny as the U.S. Supreme Court has applied that standard.

That's... very strange. Usually, once a court recognizes that something is not in an exempted bucket, it finds the law to be unconstitutional. Here, Vermont is carving new territory. Thankfully, as part of saying that revenge porn is not in an already exempted bucket is a good thing, as it wipes out the incorrect claim by some law professors that you could just say that revenge porn is obscene (which would be very problematic). The court correctly highlights how there are massive differences between what is obscene and what is revenge porn, and notes (correctly again) that the Supreme Court is loathe to expand the definition of obscene:

We recognize that some of the characteristics of obscenity that warrant its regulation also characterize nonconsensual pornography, but we take our cues from the Supreme Court’s reluctance to expand the scope of obscenity on the basis of a purpose-based analysis.

Next, the court (correctly!) says it's in no position to create a new category of exempted speech:

Although many of the State’s arguments support the proposition that the speech at issue in this case does not enjoy full First Amendment protection, we decline to identify a new categorical exclusion from the full protections of the First Amendment when the Supreme Court has not yet addressed the question.

Indeed, the Vermont Supreme Court highlights how frequently the US Supreme Court has been tossing out laws that try to create new categories of unprotected speech:

[W]e decline to predict that the Supreme Court will add nonconsensual pornography to the list of speech categorically excluded. We base our declination on two primary considerations: the Court’s recent emphatic rejection of attempts to name previously unrecognized categories, and the oft-repeated reluctance of the Supreme Court to adopt broad rules dealing with state regulations protecting individual privacy as they relate to free speech.

More than once in recent years, the Supreme Court has rebuffed efforts to name new categories of unprotected speech. In Stevens, the Court emphatically refused to add “depictions of animal cruelty” to the list, rejecting the notion that the court has “freewheeling authority to declare new categories of speech outside the scope of the First Amendment.” 559 U.S. at 472. The Court explained, “Maybe there are some categories of speech that have been historically unprotected, but have not yet been specifically identified or discussed as such in our case law. But if so, there is no evidence that ‘depictions of animal cruelty’ is among them.” Id. A year later, citing Stevens, the Court declined to except violent video games sold to minors from the full protections of the First Amendment. Brown, 564 U.S. at 790-93 (“[N]ew categories of unprotected speech may not be added to the list by a legislature that concludes certain speech is too harmful to be tolerated.”). And a year after that, the Court declined to add false statements to the list. Alvarez, 567 U.S. at 722 (affirming appeals court ruling striking conviction for false statements about military decorations).

More significantly, as set forth more extensively above... in case after case involving a potential clash between the government’s interest in protecting individual privacy and the First Amendment’s free speech protections, the Supreme Court has consistently avoided broad pronouncements, and has defined the issue at hand narrowly, generally reconciling the tension in favor of free speech in the context of speech about matters of public interest while expressly reserving judgment on the proper balance in cases where the speech involves purely private matters. The considerations that would support the Court’s articulation of a categorical exclusion in this case may carry great weight in the strict scrutiny analysis.... But we leave it to the Supreme Court in the first instance to designate nonconsensual pornography as a new category of speech that falls outside the First Amendment’s full protections.

So then why doesn't the court declare this law unconstitutional? Well, that has lawyers like Mark Bennett and Eric Goldman perplexed. To pass "strict scrutiny," the court has to find that the law was passed to further a "compelling government interest" and that the legislation must be "narrowly tailored" to address just the issue for which the government has such a compelling reason.

Here, the court finds that there is a compelling government interest, saying that revenge porn images are not a matter of public concern, and serious harms created by revenge porn make it so that the government has a compelling interest in outlawing such content. Fair enough. But what about the "narrowly tailored" part. That seems like where such a law should fall down, but nope:

Section 2606 defines unlawful nonconsensual pornography narrowly, including limiting it to a confined class of content, a rigorous intent element that encompasses the nonconsent requirement, an objective requirement that the disclosure would cause a reasonable person harm, an express exclusion of images warranting greater constitutional protection, and a limitation to only those images that support the State’s compelling interest because their disclosure would violate a reasonable expectation of privacy. Our conclusion on this point is bolstered by a narrowing interpretation of one provision that we offer to ensure that the statute is duly narrowly tailored. The fact that the statute provides for criminal as well as civil liability does not render it inadequately tailored.

But, of course, the real problem is that all of these laws criminalize tons of content that should otherwise be protected. And here, the court more or less ignores that, by saying that the potentially overbroad nature of the law wasn't raised by the defendant:

The Supreme Court has recognized that in a facial challenge to a regulation of speech based on overbreadth, a law may be invalidated if “a substantial number of its applications are unconstitutional, judged in relation to the statute’s plainly legitimate sweep.” Id. at 473 (quotation omitted). Defendant here does not frame his challenge to the statute as an overbreadth challenge but instead argues that insofar as the speech restricted by the statute is content-based, the statute is presumptively invalid and fails strict scrutiny review.

But, as Mark Bennett highlights, this is the court completely missing that "overbreadth" is the thing you check to see if a statute is "narrowly tailored." But that's not what happened. Here, the court said no one raised the "overbreadth" issue, and thus it doesn't need to bother. So, instead, it says that the law is narrowly tailored based on how the law is written with a "rigorous intent element." But, that's not how the test works. As Bennett explains:

To pass strict scrutiny, a restriction must be narrowly tailored. It is logically impossible for a statute to be both overbroad and narrowly tailored. Strict scrutiny and overbreadth are not separate analyses. If a content-based restriction is substantially overbroad—if it restricts a real and substantial amount of constitutionally protected speech—it is ipso facto not narrowly tailored, and it fails strict scrutiny.

This is a confused mess of a ruling. As Eric Goldman notes, it's possible this could be appealed to the US Supreme Court, though it's unlikely that such a petition would be granted. It does seem likely that eventually this issue would need to be looked over by the Supreme Court to clarify the confusion. But, in the meantime, the law in Vermont stands.

Apparently having some extra free time on his schedule, he has sued Twitter, pro se of course. It's a fun read, and extra amusing as it comes just days after Chuck Johnson's lawsuit against Twitter on sorta similar grounds was tentatively tossed out of court. At least Johnson had an actual lawyer file his suit. Brittain's lawsuit, of course, cites the Packingham decision that a bunch of people have been misrepresenting to claim that it says social media can be considered a public forum. Brittain combines his misrepresentation of that opinion with a misrepresentation of the recent decision that President Trump cannot block followers, in order to claim that Twitter can't kick off any political candidate.

This lawsuit implicates Twitter's responsibility as a public forum as recently ruled in Knight First Amendment Institute v. Trump et. al... where the honorable Naomi Reice Buchwald, Judge for the Southern District of New York, ruled that President Donald J. Trump must unblock all Twitter users, regardless of the content of their messaging, and also ruled that President Trump's Twitter space is an interactive public forum. The ruling also implicates that Twitter itself is a public forum space under the US Constitution, and thus all First Amendment Protections (must) apple to its use.

Yeah, that's not what that ruling said at all, but, I guess you get points for trying?

In regards to Knight First Amendment Center v. Trump, Defendant must reasonably provide access to that public forum space by unsuspending all users who are followers of President Donald J. Trump or any other public official or candidate, as well as any/all public candidates and officials, whether they are supporters, critics, or neutral to the points of view of the President of the United States or any other candidate or elected official.

Likewise, being as President Donald J. Trump is one of many politicians whose tweets create such a public space, Twitter must extend that same public forum to followers and critics of all US politicians and subsequently all journalistic outlets, in order to protect two-way freedom of speech established by the First Amendment.

Two-way freedom of speech? That's a new one. I'm sure the court will just accept this totally made-up, nonsensical concept, especially right after you totally misrepresent the findings of the Knight Center ruling (in which Twitter wasn't even a party and in which Twitter was not required to do anything). The lawsuit also contains many paragraphs of meaningless nonsense about how Twitter is not a neutral platform, which... has no impact on anything (even if some people -- including some actual Senators -- want to pretend otherwise).

Also, this (capitalization in the original):

The loss of the Accounts is a Crippling Blow to Plaintiffs and Others, and presents a Chilling Effect to the First Amendment and other Constitutional Rights, where a Crippling Blow shall be defined as 'an unconscionable and substantial loss with no defined legal remedy or recourse', and a Chilling Effect shall be defined as 'an action which suppresses similar/related rights including but not limited to the First Amendment rights to access and utilize a public forum for speech as well as the desire of other users to speak out against similar actions, for fear of action(s) such as censorship, suspension/ban, shadowban or downranking being taken against them as well'.

That's all one sentence. Try to say it in a single breath. It's fun. Anyway, this is also not how law works, and clearly there's little need to go step by step over how wrong this is... but I'll just note that when you define your own made up tort as one "with no defined legal remedy or recourse" you've basically just admitted that your entire lawsuit is bullshit.

Not to be missed is Brittain's discussion of who he is in the "Parties" section, in which he claims that "he has committed himself to reinventing and rehabilitating his life and image" and that Twitter was a necessary component to this. He leaves out the many people who he attacked (disclaimer: including me) with his account(s) over the years. Similarly, he tries to paint himself as "lifelong champion of free and even dangerous speech as a natural right" while (yet again) ignoring his repeated attempts to abuse the law to try to silence reports of his own history running a revenge porn site, setting up a fake lawyer to demand payments to get pictures off of that site, and the eventual FTC settlement concerning that whole effort. But really, it's the next part that's the most laugh inducing:

His accumulated total followers (over 400,000) have made him the most popular anarchist/libertarian thinker in world history, where anarchism is defined as 'self-government by peaceful and voluntary interaction and exchange', governed by the Non-Aggression Principle, defined as 'to not harm anyone or their property'.

Got that? He is the most popular anarchist/libertarian thinker in world history. Because he had 400,000 followers (and that's leaving aside news reports that claimed that almost half of Brittain's followers were fake). And make sure you don't miss out on the fact that Brittain is important because some wrestlers followed him on Twitter. That's in there too. It goes on like this for a while. There's also an impressively long section in which Brittain namechecks a bunch of other accounts that Twitter suspended for no clear reason, followed by even more examples where a bunch of people freak out and claim that they've been shadowbanned (even though it's unclear if they actually were). Incredibly, there are then 17 pages (which Brittain lists as a single paragraph in his filing) that repost an EFF brief in the Knight Center case that doesn't actually say what Brittain then pretends it says. This is not an appendix or an exhibit. It's just stuck there right in the middle of Brittain's complaint. This is followed by a lengthy treatise on the fact that President Obama used Twitter, which has no bearing on... well... anything.

At this point, you're on page 60 of the filing and you finally (finally!) get to the first actual cause of action which is, incredibly, "Violation of the First Amendment of the US Constitution." Which, as we've already discussed (and other courts have already found) is nonsense. Twitter is not bound by the First Amendment. That only restricts government entities. There are a bunch of other claims as well, some more nutty than others -- but all of them pretty nutty. The antitrust claim is a personal favorite. The "proof" of monopoly power in that one? The claim that Twitter controls 25% of the US social networking market. Which, uh, is not the definition of a monopoly, but Brittain's suit claims: "Therefore, it can logically be concluded that Defendant is in possession of monopoly power." This statement is not explained any further.

Also: Brittain claims that Twitter is violating CDA 230. CDA 230, of course, being the intermediary liability protection statute that literally explains why this case is nonsense and will get tossed out. It's the part of the law that says Twitter can moderate its platform however it likes. But Brittain tries to twist that.. by claiming that because Twitter itself uses Twitter, it is now an information content provider, rather than a service provider, and therefore liable for third party content:

Defendant's protections under 47 U.S. Code §230 stem from its classification as an interactive computer service. However, the presence of @Policy and unequal treatment for its users, as well as the promotion of content it agrees with ("Moments" "Front Page") and the "downranking" of content it disagrees with (to include suspensions and shadowbanning) indicate(s) that Twitter is actually an information content provider. Thereby, Twitter should be declared liable for content which appears on its platform, until at which point it ceases to act as an information content provider, and acts solely as an interactive computer service.

Nice theory. Too bad it's been rejected by basically every court since 230 became law. Courts have (rightly) found that internet services can be both an interactive computer service and an information content provider -- such that they are liable solely for the content they produce, but not for the content third parties produce on their platform. But, Brittain apparently is unaware of the reams of caselaw on this... which I guess is not that surprising.

We'd be remiss if we didn't also mention Brittain's proposed remedies. It starts off asking for a whole long list of nonsensical injunctions and declarations, then lawsuit costs and attorney's fees (he's filed this without attorneys, of course) and then "such other and further relief as this Court deems just and proper," which is normally where these kinds of things would end. But then he seems to remember that he wants money, so after all that he adds in a demand for $1 billion dollars. Well, at least I think that's what he's demanding. He calls it an injunction, which is not what you call a monetary award, and then has some sort of weird formula in which an injunction is summary judgment and it has to do with Twitter's valuation, because [reasons].

For an injunction in the form of an additional summary judgment for the Plaintiff, against the Defendant, in accordance with Defendant's valuation of over $25 Billion US Dollars, of no less than $1,000,000,000.00 US Dollars.

An injunction in the form of summary judgment in accordance with a valuation for a billion dollars? This is a word salad of legal nonsense.

Anyway, if the past is any indication, we eagerly await this "lifelong champion of free and even dangerous speech as a natural right" to now seek to have this article deleted from Google. But, we also eagerly await the "LOLwut?" response from the poor judge assigned this case.

from the do-it-right-or-you-might-as-well-not-do-it-at-all dept

Texas attorney Mark Bennett -- instrumental in getting an unconstitutional "peeping tom" law tossed in 2014 -- has scored another win for the First Amendment by getting an unconstitutional revenge porn law tossed. It's not that anyone (except revenge porn purveyors) wants to see revenge porn go unchecked. It's that there's plenty of laws on the books already to address the problem and those written to target revenge porn tend to do collateral damage to the Constitution.

As has been argued from the day Mary Anne Franks began her efforts to create a criminal revenge porn statute, it clearly implicated the First Amendment’s prohibition against laws infringing on free expression, to which she merely screamed her denials and did her best to deflect by creating a fantasy interpretation of the First Amendment. The court made swift work of it.

In the instant case, Section 21.16(b) proscribes the disclosure of certain visual material, including any film, photograph, or videotape in various formats. Because the photographs and visual recordings are inherently expressive and the First Amendment applies to the distribution of such expressive media in the same way it applies to their creation, we conclude that the right to freedom of speech is implicated in this case.

As the court notes, the restriction on revenge porn is content-based. Content-based restrictions require greater scrutiny to adhere to the Constitution and Texas' law cannot hold up to this level of scrutiny. From the decision [PDF]:

In the instant case, the State conceded at oral argument that Section 21.16(b) properly is subject to strict scrutiny analysis. We agree. Here, Section 21.16(b)(1) does not penalize all intentional disclosure of visual material depicting another person. See TEX. PENAL CODE ANN. § 21.16(b)(1). Rather, Section 21.16(b)(1) penalizes only a subset of disclosed images, those which depict another person with the person’s intimate parts exposed or engaged in sexual conduct. See id. § 21.16(a)(1), (3), (b)(1). Therefore, we conclude that Section 21.16(b)(1) discriminates on the basis of content.

The state tried to claim revenge porn is always obscene material. As the court points out, the state cannot make this determination on its own. It needs the court's help and, further than that, courts need a jury's help to determine whether or not disputed content is actually obscene.

Then it points out the obvious flaw in this argument -- one the state should have caught before arguing a new, unconstitutional law was needed to regulate obscenity.

Here, Section 21.16 does not include language that would permit a trier of fact to determine that the visual material disclosed is obscene. Moreover, if, as the State argues, any visual material disclosed under Section 21.16(b) is obscene, the statute is wholly redundant in light of Texas’s obscenity statutes.

Having dispensed with the state's attempts to salvage a redundant law, the court gives it this send off -- a light kick to ass of legislators and the state's legal counsel: DO BETTER.

At the very least, Section 21.16(b)(2) could be narrowed by requiring that the disclosing person have knowledge of the circumstances giving rise to the depicted person’s privacy expectation. But because Section 21.16(b) does not use the least restrictive means of achieving what we have assumed to be the compelling government interest of preventing the intolerable invasion of a substantial privacy interest, it is an invalid content-based restriction in violation of the First Amendment.

Once again, it's not that revenge porn should be ignored. It's that it's almost impossible to craft a law targeting revenge porn without doing damage to the First Amendment. As multiple prosecutions have shown, revenge porn purveyors tend to break plenty of existing laws. Prosecutors and regulators have had little problem shutting down sites using laws not specifically created to target revenge porn. The problem is most legislators like to appear to be doing something about societal issues, but often have little interest in ensuring their proposed statutes are Constitutionally-sound before pushing them across governors' desks. As the court points out here, a little care taken during the crafting process would have gone a long way towards keeping this law alive.

from the an-apparent-impossibility-given-the-lack-of-a-federal-revenge-porn-law dept

There ought to be a law, say many people opposed to revenge porn. And so they craft laws with an eye on prosecution but not so much on the First Amendment, tending to treat collateral damage as acceptable so long as revenge porn site operators are criminally charged. But the proposed laws are more than bad, they're extraneous. Existing laws are still taking down revenge porn purveyors, as we've covered previously at this site.

The FTC has taken down another revenge porn site and secured a judgment against one of its operations, all without having to having to hack away at protected speech or undermine Section 230 immunity. MyEx.com -- a site "dedicated solely to revenge porn" -- has been targeted in an FTC complaint.

According to the complaint, visitors to MyEx.com can rate the videos and pictures they see and post comments about the victims. At various times, the site included victims’ full date of birth, personal email address, telephone number, and links to social media profiles, along with the intimate images.

The FTC alleges that the defendants were aware that many of the individuals did not agree to having their intimate images and personal information posted to MyEx.com. As of December 2017, there were approximately 12,620 entries on the site, according to the complaint.

The complaint [PDF] contains extensive documentation of the site runners' activities, including charging people anywhere from $499 up to $2,800 for removal of pictures and information, as well as the site's operator creating a wholly (and admittedly) fictitious business entity to hide behind.

Defendant Applegate registered the domain MyEx.com through domain name registrar GoDaddy from November 2011 through at least June 2013. He provided GoDaddy the email address shad@myex.com as his contact address.

In May of 2013, GoDaddy informed Defendant Applegate of reports of child exploitation and underage content on MyEx.com. GoDaddy also informed Defendant Applegate that an investigator from an internet-crimes-against-children taskforce and a police detective were attempting to get in touch with the website operators.

Also in May 2013, Defendant Applegate changed the contact name provided to GoDaddy for the MyEx.com website to “Eun Kim” and changed the contact address to Singel 540, 1017 AZ Amsterdam, Netherlands, while leaving the contact email address as shad@myex.com for a period of time. After GoDaddy inquired about this change, Defendant Applegate told GoDaddy in a message, “its [sic] not a company it’s a made up name for the address & [sic]; phone number in the Netherlands. The [expletive] domain is in my godaddy [sic] account.” Defendant Applegate then moved MyEx.com to a different registrar, Eurodns. He provided Eurodns the contact name “Eun Kim” and changed MyEx.com to be associated with the fictional business entity, Web Solutions B.V. He provided a contact address of Singel 540, 1017 AZ Amsterdam, Netherlands, which was the same address he told GoDaddy that he made up.

This fictitious address was also used to ignore DMCA complaints and other requests for removal of content.

Under the “Contact Us” page, the site stated, “Myex.com has no removals [sic] policy. If you are an adult who has been submitted to this site tough luck [sic].” The page went on to state, “If you have the need to send mail please address it to MyEx.com c/o Web Solutions B.V. Attn Legal Department DMCA Complaints. Websolutions Netherlands, Singel 540 1017 Amsterdam The Netherlands Attn: Legal Department.”

Paid removals were handled in a similarly shady fashion. The site's operators made those seeking content removal wire money to someone named "Shelly Mae Garcia" who supposedly lived in the Philippines. Those who refused to pay the extortion were invited to send snail mail to the fake address in the Netherlands.

The FTC finds the site owners to be in violation of the FTC Act, which prohibits unfair or deceptive acts or practices by business entities. As is detailed in the complaint, there's no shortage of evident harm created by the site's posting of intimate photos without the consent of those depicted, along with as much personal info (names, addresses, social media accounts) as the site could harvest.

The settlement [PDF] with one of the site's owners, Neil Infante, prohibits him from posting intimate photos without the explicit, written consent of the photo's subject. It also subjects Infante to 20 years of FTC monitoring and a $205,000 fine. (It appears the FTC will only be able to collect $15,000 of this fine. The FTC's press release states the rest of the fine will be suspended as Infante has shown "an inability to pay more.") Infante is also prohibited from charging takedown fees for any content whose removal is requested. The FTC is still seeking to obtain judgments against the other participants in the revenge porn operation and is ordering Infante to turn over as much info as he has on his revenge porn colleagues.

This revenge porn operation is effectively dead. The nonconsensual part of the operation is blocked by the FTC judgment and the inability to charge removal fees pretty eliminates the most profitable revenue stream. It's unclear what the future holds for Neil Infante, but it appears the Republican Senate race in Ohio (Infante's home state) is suddenly in need of a new frontrunner. Perhaps FTC judgment recipient and former revenge porn site operator Craig Brittain could send his colleague a few ideas on to how to MAGA the hell out of the nation as a Senate race bottom-feeder.

Harris' bill [PDF] will likely be remembered more for its too-clever acronym than its content. The ENOUGH Act of 2017 (brace yourself: Ending Nonconsensual Online User Graphic Harassment) is another attempt to criminalize revenge porn at the federal level. The problem is the subject matter is slippery and difficult to nail down precisely enough to avoid First Amendment concerns.

The bill does make an attempt at narrowly crafting a definition and at least tries to limit the liability of platforms hosting user-generated content, but it still has some issues. For one, the definition of images covered by the act is a bit too vague to prevent the possible criminalization of harmless images.

The term ‘intimate visual depiction’ means any visual depiction (as that term is defined in section 2256(5)), in original or modified format, of an individual who is reasonably identifiable from the image itself or information displayed in connection with the image, in which—

(A) the individual is engaging in sexually explicit conduct; or

(B) the naked genitals or post-pubescent female nipple of the individual are visible.

The non-consensual sharing of photos of men clad only in their underwear is apparently fine as only the female nipple is afforded protection. And if all it takes is an exposed female nipple to trigger possible charges, anyone who captures images of wardrobe malfunctions, breastfeeding mothers, or topless protesters better have some waiver forms on hand.

But beyond that, there's the issue of sharing of any explicit depiction without the consent of all parties. Any non-consensual sharing of depictions of sexual activity and/or nudity is criminalized unless the person can show the sharing was a "matter of public concern." This would be the bill's journalism exception. There are also exceptions for law enforcement, legal proceedings, and "good faith" reporting of unlawful activity.

What makes this bill a bit better than many of its competitors is the burden placed on the government to prove intent.

[I]t shall be unlawful to knowingly use any means or facility of interstate or foreign commerce to distribute an intimate visual depiction of an individual—

(1) with knowledge of or reckless disregard for—

(A) the lack of consent of the individual to the distribution;

(B) the reasonable expectation of the individual that the depiction would remain private; and

(C) harm that the distribution could cause to the individual; and

(2) without an objectively reasonable belief that such distribution touches upon a matter of public concern

The bill also drags service providers into the mix, but fortunately doesn't expect them to police content or otherwise threaten their Section 230 protections. The only service providers that would be targeted would be those that "intentionally solicit and predominantly distribute content" that the provider "knows" is in violation of the law. So, there's intent needed to be proven there as well.

Still, the bill has some questionable components. First, the bill treats threats of publication as equally criminal as actual publication. In both cases, violators could be subject to an unspecified fine and up to five years in prison. It also includes an extraterritoriality clause that would allow the US to pursue overseas violators as long as the subject depicted was an American. We'll have to see if that still holds up once Congressional lawyers have taken a look at it.

Overall, the bill isn't terrible. It requires a showing of intent, something other revenge porn laws have disregarded. It does still present some First Amendment issues because the stipulations attached to violation (expectation depiction would remain private, distribution would cause harm to the subject depicted, etc.) are bound to swallow up some journalistic endeavors or documentation of sexual assault allegations (if the latter isn't shared exclusively with law enforcement). The edge cases will be left to prosecutors' discretion, which definitely isn't a good thing. All the evidence needed to argue for less prosecutorial discretion is the long string of embarrassments committed by prosecutors pursuing charges against sexting teens.

Given the aggressiveness of Harris' pursuit of Backpage for sex trafficking, it's somewhat of a surprise to a Harris-backed revenge porn bill take a mostly hands off approach to internet service providers. Still, there's a chance the bill could be made worse after a few markup rounds, turning it from an almost-acceptable piece of legislation into a speech-chilling, Section 230-damaging monstrosity.

Brittain followed this up with more reputation mismanagement, raining down insults on a Twitter user who dared to unfollow him. He's continued to poll the electorate in similar ways on Facebook, telling people they're wrong about everything if they don't agree with him, but especially about free speech and the concept of consent.

That's what's happening above ground. Behind the scenes at Facebook, Craig Brittain is engaged in more bogus takedown efforts, this time in an attempt to scrub the web of a string of insults he sent to a woman via Facebook Messenger. The following comes from Shooting the Messenger, with an assist by Asher Langton.

Earlier this week, social media expert Michael Palladino from Phoenix, Arizona, posted potentially damaging screenshots of abusive messages Brittain allegedly sent to a woman on Facebook last year.

"A woman I know got these messages early last year from a guy who is now running for AZ senate. He most likely doesn't stand a chance against Ward or Krysten Sinema but the fact that he's running at all is disgusting given the kind of guy he is. And now that Flake is out, he might get more media visibility. So it's important that this shit is known.

He has his supporters and their response to things like this is that he's the victim of some kind of conspiratorial hoax revenge machine, as if he would be so important as to catch the eye of the Illuminati or the Lizard People or whoever they think is responsible for their lives being shit. Or they agree with his views on women. Or they just don't care.

Applauding anti-politicians who "tell it like it is" and "don't care about being P.C." can easily become the shallow backyard pool that breeds diseased mosquitoes like this.

We've heard an impersonator is harassing people. Those messages aren't from us.

While it's adorable Brittain's pretending he's got some sort of Senate race team operating out of Brittain HQ, the simple fact is Brittain reported Palladino's post to make it go away. In the process, he has possibly nuked one of his own personal accounts, which Facebook may decide belongs to an imposter. The account referenced in the Brittain's takedown request belongs to none other than Craig R. Brittain.

As Sterling Jones points out, Brittain really shouldn't be reporting his own Facebook accounts as belonging to impersonators. I'm sure Facebook has compiled enough data to determine who actually owns the "Craig R. Brittain" account Craig R. Brittain For Senate now claims is a fake. This is ammo for FTC sanctions.

So far, Brittain has used the account to push at least one (still nonexistent) ride sharing company and is engaged in a Senate run -- arguably a public "good/service," even if the list of candidates leaves something to be desired. There's no reason to believe the FTC will step in, though. And we really don't need it to. (Unless our schadenfreude reserves have run dangerously low.) It appears Brittain's perfectly capable of sabotaging his own future without government intercession.

from the bad-cases-make-bad-law dept

What were we just saying about how it's important to defend Section 230 of the CDA even when it's hard? Well, here's a hard case in New York City where the situation is very unfortunate. It appears that a woman discovered that an old sex tape of hers had surfaced online from 10 years earlier when she was 17. Someone had posted it to Tumblr, where over 1,000 people apparently viewed it -- and somewhere around 500 "reblogged" it or commented on it in some manner. This is, undoubtedly, traumatic for the woman. She appears to believe that "an angry ex" posted it to Tumblr originally, which would make this a classic "revenge porn" situation.

But... rather than go after that ex, her lawyer is going after everyone who reblogged it on Tumblr and somehow got a judge to agree to force Tumblr to cough up identifying information on all of them. So let's be clear: this is clearly a horrifying story and an awful thing for the woman to live through. And, on top of that, the people who not only viewed, but further shared the video are awful human beings who should feel bad about their choices in life.

But... there are all sorts of legal questions here that should raise concerns. First up: Section 230. That should have kept Tumblr from being liable if it fails to hand over this info, as it's not supposed to be held liable for the actions of its users. And that's even -- as noted by Scott Greenfield -- after Tumblr failed to show up in court and the judge gave the plaintiff a default ruling. Second issue: protecting anonymity online. As we've detailed many times before, and as the Supreme Court has stated, the right to speak anonymously is also protected by the First Amendment. There arestandards for revealing identifying information on anonymous speech, but it requires those in court clear a pretty high bar in proving why it's necessary to strip that right of anonymity. It does not appear that any such high bar was met in this case. Third issue: on Tumblr, "reblogging" something is basically a click of a button and is often the functional equivalent of a "retweet" for those more familiar with Twitter. That is, it does not signal endorsement -- but really just a way of marking something that you saw.

So, again, this is one of those cases where it certainly feels very difficult to defend the other side here. I have nothing good to say about the people who watched or reblogged the video. But getting Tumblr to reveal their identities so that she can proceed to sue them is a bad idea fraught with all sorts of problems.

Here's a bit more background on that particular "business venture" from Ken White:

More recently, Craig has embarked on two simultaneous paths: the path of a social critic and aspiring pseudo-journalist seeking investors to back his anarcho-capitalist critique of society, and aspiring CEO of Uber competitor "Dryvyng," a business devoted to the proposition that if you'd like a ride you ought to order one from a pathological revenge porn extortionist with a searing hatred of women and humanity in general. Craigbo has sought to raise capital for Dryvyng through disturbed and bigoted tirades at venture capitalists. Perhaps prolonged exposure to MRA rhetoric led him to believe that negging was a viable strategy for developing startup capital. Conclusion: nah, bro. Nah.

Business Insider is fake news and the "investor" was actually a paid internet troll. Internet trolls (who have no money to invest) deserve to get cussed out. Please remove this libelous, slanderous article about my company immediately.

Fake, slanderous, libelous article defaming me and my company and abusing copyrighted material. Fusion is a fake news website run by left-wing social justice warriors with the aim of defaming conservatives and libertarians.

Slanderous, libelous and deliberately misleading Wikipedia entry designed to defame and libel me and my company. Please permanently remove this page (and all of Wikipedia itself, which is a left-wing hive for slander and libel) from Google.

In this case, the DMCA notice targets nothing about Dryvyng, but instead the site's article about Brittain's revenge porn site.

In every case, the accusation is internet libelslander, which can't be touched by DMCA notices. The reason is in the name of the notice itself: Digital Millennium COPYRIGHT Act. But when you're angry at the internet, any fill-in-the-blank form will do. Even if Brittain had used the proper paperwork, Google would be under no obligation to delist the alleged slander, thanks to Section 230 of the CDA.

It's no surprise Brittain's attempt to pass himself off as David Blade, Esq. went so badly. He obviously has zero legal acumen. If you're going to beclown yourself with bogus notices, at least try to do so somewhat competently. Sure, the outcome won't change, but at least you won't look like even more of an idiot than you already do.

from the errors-in-target-selection dept

Someone else who doesn't understand Section 230 of the CDA is suing search engines for "refusing" to delist revenge porn. The short complaint -- filed in New York and spotted by Eric Goldman -- is signed by an actual lawyer, but the complaint is so devoid of legitimate (or any) legal arguments, it could be mistaken for a pro se attempt.

According to the complaint, a number of sexually explicit videos were posted to porn websites after a relationship went bad. The plaintiff contacted the websites and had the videos removed, which would seem to have solved the problem. But it didn't. According to the plaintiff, Yahoo, Bing, and Google searches for her name still bring up websites containing the explicit videos. Here's the wording used in the complaint [PDF]:

6. That the search Plaintiff's full name on Defendants' website led and still leads to pornographic videos of the Plaintiff, and other derogatory comments aimed at the Plaintiff and containing Plaintiff's full name.

A search for her name does pull up everything she complains of. According to Abodo, these search results have prevented her from getting a job and have tarnished her reputation.

However, her complaint demands the removal of her name from search engines, which is an impossibility. She obviously wants the search results for her name removed, but hasn't actually asked for that in her complaint.

This filing will be sent back for amending as soon as a judge reads it, but applying some fixes to that particular language won't turn this into a winnable case. Her other efforts -- contacting websites to have the videos removed -- is something she's had some success with. It won't work with every site and there's almost no chance the "derogatory comments" scattered around the web will be removed, no matter how much she petitions these websites. But that's going to be far more productive than this litigation will be.

Section 230 gives the sites immunity for users' comments. It's also the reason targeting search engines isn't likely to result in delistings. Search engines return search results. They're in no way responsible for the content contained in the search results.

This is the easiest route -- far easier than tracking down those making the comments or posting the videos -- but it has about the same chances for success. Even with the damage being done to Section 230 by courts recently, it's going to take far more than this bare-bones pleading to even begin to mount a successful legal battle over unflattering search engine results.

But this short filing does lie at the crux of an issue where Section 230 is likely to receive the most collateral damage: revenge porn. Legislative efforts have been made in many states and, with almost no exceptions, the efforts include language that undermines the protections of Section 230 by attempting to shift some degree of culpability to service providers. The same sort of damage could result from a precedential ruling in a federal court if any revenge porn-based case makes it that far.

The underlying activity is horrendous and does a significant amount of damage to victims, but shifting the responsibility anywhere but the person posting the content poses the risk of opening up service providers to criminal charges and/or civil litigation -- something that would do tremendous harm to openness and freedom of the internet.

This isn't the case that's going to start that ball rolling, however. The actual perpetrators aren't listed as defendants, which means this is nothing more than a low-cost Hail Mary by Abodo and her legal rep.